Since the last time I wrote to you, I have traveled to Egypt and spent some time there with one of my best friends from high school. This has been a very eye opening experience for me. I have never been out of the U.S. with the exception of Canada.
Egypt varies by location much more than I ever would have expected. We went from staying in Cairo with a population of over 20 million, to laying on the ground and eating dinner with some locals in a small farming village. The beginning of the trip proved to be much more difficult than I expected. We were in Cairo for 4 days before I ever found anyone who spoke good English. On the forth day we met Mahmod. Mahmod was a farmer and he would bring his horses to the pyramids and rent them to tourists to ride around. After we rented his horses and spent some time with him, Mahmod invited us to go have dinner with his family back in the village. We ended up becoming great friends with Mahmod and his family and we stayed with them for a few days.
I have always grown up knowing I am very fortunate and blessed to have the things that I have but it brings a whole new meaning to it once you go to a place like this. You begin talking to these people and it is such a humbling experience. It’s the little things that we would shrug off that mean so much to them. Like sunglasses and candy. Mahmod has these sunglasses that were given to him four years ago by an American and he still wears them everyday. Isaac and I brought Mahmod a pack of peanut M&M’s and he would only eat a few of them because he wanted his whole family to be able to try them. You hear about places like this all the time but it never really hit me until I went and lived it and stayed in one of these places.
This trip has been such a great experience. I know this mission trip is not going to be easy but God has definitely used this trip to Egypt to better prepare me for this upcoming chapter of my life.
Also here is a picture of Mahmod and us. I promised him I would put his picture on my page.
